i think since cable companies r regional, it may be better to give a specific city, because i have cox cable and its only around where i live...i think..and in la...so might be totally wrong about the whole regional cable thing in general

speed also depends on how far u live blah blah blah so a dsl can be better than cable or vice versa, from my own practice i think in general dsl is faster...however what a lot of my friends do is get cable and a cable modem and then use their cell phones so they dont need a land line...but i think ur parents would prefer a land line...u should just ask ur friends around the area what they use..theres a lot of speed tests on the internet u can use to check ur transfer rates such as a tool on msn.com i think...

dsl speed is dependent on how far away you live from a dsl hub. if you live close, then your speed will be good. if you live far, you might as well use an accelerated dialup.

dsl pricing also is different for the amount of bandwidth/throughput you want. comcast recently upped their throughput to 3Mbps which is ridiculously fast. a lot of dsl carriers limit individual dsl account to around a tenth of that...